Your Personality Type, Defined by the Internet

In some ways, the Internet has become a game of “type and be typed.” Now you can play it at home, too. Companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter look at the queries, observations, updates and enthusiasms we write on their services, then they try to figure out what ads might have the most persuasive effect on us.

A start-up called Five posted a tool that gives a sense of what the big web companies might see when they look at us. Using a link to Facebook posts, Five analyzes the language in which we write, and determines our relative affiliation to five personality attributes: openness, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and neuroticism. It then shows comparisons with famous people (based on their public writings and statements), as well as your Facebook friends.